Jacob Ogles
Americans for Prosperity has released its agenda ahead of the 2023 Legislative Session. The “Florida Freedom Agenda” touched on school choice, regulatory reform and free speech.
“Session after session, Americans for Prosperity-Florida has played a key role in advancing free-market, bottom-up solutions to the most pressing issues facing Floridians,” said AFP-FL State Director Skylar Zander.
“The ‘Florida Freedom Agenda’ outlines how our unrivaled team of grassroots advocates plans to make the voices of students, families, patients, workers and business owners heard this Legislative Session. This agenda will ensure that the Sunshine State can continue to pioneer market-based policies to remove barriers to success and empower all Floridians to achieve their potential. Innovative and entrepreneurial reforms in education, health care and Florida’s regulatory environment will safeguard our state against the runaway spending of the federal government and an uncertain economic future.”
The conservative organization put its support behind universal school choice, a top priority for Speaker Paul Renner.
“Parents and students are best equipped to make their own decisions about their educational needs, not the government. AFP-FL will support educational reforms that empower students and families to tailor education to their individual needs by flipping the funding paradigm,” the release from AFP read.
“Universal Education Savings Accounts will allow families to direct their child’s funding to the schools, courses and real-world learning opportunities that best serve them. The organization will also advance entrepreneurial reforms to provide a wide variety of educational environments and services, allowing students and families to customize their education and reduce standardization.”
In the health care arena, the group wants a repeal of any certificate of need regulations still on the books. The organization also wants an expansion of telehealth availability, while it opposes any expansion of Medicaid in Florida. It also is calling for “Robust Scope of Practice Reform, including expansion of Prescriptive Authority for properly trained medical professionals.”
The pro-business organization encouraged regulatory reform this year.
“AFP-FL will work to support innovative and bottom-up approaches to reforming Florida’s regulatory environment,” a release said. “Correcting government over-regulation with market-based solutions, eliminating unnecessary licensing fees, and expanding licensing reciprocity with other states will protect Florida’s businesses and make it easier for workers and businesses to thrive.”
The group spoke up in favor of free speech and free expression. “Free speech and expression greatly facilitate the discovery and dissemination of knowledge,” the agenda read. “When this happens, the best ideas rise to the top and people are better able to make decisions.”
AFP leaders said all of this will lead to a stronger economy for all Floridians.
“It may sometimes feel like the problems facing Florida, and our nation, are insurmountable,” Zander said. “Millions of volunteers for Americans for Prosperity, however, know that with direct advocacy and a passionate defense of our nation’s founding principles, the American Dream can be preserved.”
One comment
It's Complicated
February 8, 2023 at 2:00 pm
These guys think a mile wide and an inch deep. They believe that everything will fit into the bumper sticker slogan of “regulation is bad… free market is good.” And while that may be true where a free market exists (like pizza parlors), it generally does NOT exist in healthcare, where fees are established by the Federal government (Medicare) and managed care plans, and that is accomplished by deregulation is to create market chaos. Look at what is happening in the lovely state of California right now. California deregulated healthcare and delegated survey and inspection to private sector accrediting agencies. It is an unmitigated disaster, with tens of thousands of complaints ignored, and hundreds of millions of dollars being paid by state and federal government agencies to organized crime entities who don’t even pretend to deliver services. We can have that in Florida, too! Let’s deregulate healthcare! Yay!
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